The brother dies-he calls him from the tomb;

Restores him back to life, and living joys; "Lazarus come forth!" In vain the sullen tomb

Of death would hold-it hears, it knows his voice.

Poor Martha sighs, bowed down with anxious care, To-morrow's trouble vex her thoughtful heart, "Be still," he whispers, "I'll thy burden bear," "Thy cares be mine "-her cares at once depart.

The gentle Mary sighs for living food,

Drinks in the gracious words that Jesus speaks, More precious they than aught of earthly food, While to her soul the bread of life he breaks.

Feast on blest maid! This bread shall never fail, None ere shall move thee from thy chosen seat On heavenly manna let thy soul regale,

For eyer sitting at THE MASTER's feet.

THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD,

OR THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY.

No. III.

Ancient Egypt.

IN glancing back to the early world, Egypt at once attracts our notice, as the most civilized, the most interesting, and probably the most ancient nation of which we have credible accounts. India and China, who dispute the palm of antiquity with her, have little more than their mythology to support their claims; but the dynasties of Egypt are handed down to us by various authorities, native, Jewish, and Grecian.

The Egyptian chronology, too, however disfigured by some writers with periods of incredible length, is reasonably explained by Suidas, Diodorus, St. Augustine, and other valuable authorities, on the principle of planetary, not solar years. Thus the moon frequently served for the measurement of time, and then a year meant no more than a month, or perhaps a week; while on other occasions, the period from sun-set to sun-set was considered as a year; that word merely signifying a duration of time, without specifying its length.* By

*This fact has been well worked out by M. Gibert in a tract Sur la Chronologie des Orientaux,' published at Amsterdam, 1743, to which I

following up this kind of computation, the long-tailed chronology' of the earlier Egyptian dynasties is reduced to a reasonable length, and made to coincide with the dates of subsequent historians.

As to the civilization of this wonderful country, at a period when most, if not all others were wrapped in the darkest barbarism, we need only point to its palaces and pyramids, its immense and intricate system of irrigation, its subterraneous temples and its cavern tombs,— works far surpassing those of other lands, and many of which are ascribed by Manetho to times long before those of Abraham ;-when the boasting Greeks were not yet in existence,-when Europe was a forest or a desert, Asia little better, excepting Armenia, and perhaps India and China,-and America probably altogether uninhabited and unknown.

So ancient and so extraordinary a land is well worthy of our careful attention, and we shall find it a valuable witness to the truth of our argument. Egypt, with all her wisdom, her arts, sciences, and cultivation, was dark indeed, as to morals and religion. She had undoubtedly a shew of morality in some points. Honesty, truth, and some similar social virtues were carefully cultivated, and their opposite vices punished with a severity unknown in other countries; but what can we think of a people who murdered all ship-wrecked persons and strangers, and who propitiated their gods with constant human sacrifices, and crimes such as it were a shame even to speak of," to Christian readers. Perhaps it would not be going too far to say that the

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refer my readers. Such of them as may not possess it, will find a clever summary of its statements in the Marquis Spineto's Lectures on Hieroglyphics;' (p. 399.) a work well worthy the notice of all who are interested in Egyptian history.

African devil-worship, with its living men and women cut limb from limb, combined with the abominations of India, which have been so frequently execrated, would not furnish a worse picture than the secret rites of ancient Egypt.

Alas for "all the wisdom of the Egyptians!" It was of little avail to them; separated from the life and light of Divine knowledge, it left them in as deep a moral gloom as the most besotted and barbarous of their neighbours.

The testimony of ancient history is quite clear on these points, as well as on many others, which are equally unfavourable to the wisdom and virtue of this people. Herodotus gives detailed accounts of some Egyptian feasts. (Book 2). In that of Diana, at Bubastis, he says, that more wine was consumed in one day by the worshippers, than in all the year besides. In that of Isis, celebrated at Busyris, all the multitude beat themselves, and some cut their faces with knives. At Papremis, in honour of Mars, his votaries armed themselves with maces and clubs, and attacked each other with furious blows on the head; a custom which Herodotus reasonably suspects to have been often attended by fatal results.

Porphyry informs us, that three men were sacrificed every year to the goddess of Elethyas; and Plutarch (Is. and Os. 100.) mentions, from Manetho, that men were frequently burnt alive in that city, and their ashes scattered through the air, by winnowing them in a sieve. This goddess (Neith or Rhea) was adored under the form of a vulture, and such rites were suitable to so ferocious a deity. All strangers who were so unfortunate as to have red hair, were sacrificed at the sepulchre of Osiris, according to Diodorus Siculus (I. 6.). They

were supposed to resemble Typhon, who is represented as red-headed; and all persons of that complexion were in danger of being selected for Typhos, or sacrifices to that infernal deity. Indeed, his worship was signalized beyond that of the other gods by barbarous and revolting ceremonies; and their performance at night, in desert caverns and subterraneous chambers, whose very. existence was unknown to the people at large, gave ample opportunity for cruelty and crime.

Besides, what can we expect from a people who adored their deities under the living forms of " the beasts that perish?" From a nation with whom a bull was a chief divinity, a cat or a vulture a sacred goddess, and the vile, ravenous crocodile a hallowed favourite? Nay, who went so far as to adore a leek, and fall prostrate before an onion ! *

Must we not expect that the worshippers of brutes should be little better than brutes themselves? What exalted, intellectual, benignant qualities could be looked for in him whose god was the bullock, the goat, or the crocodile ?

Another cause which tended more directly to the demoralization of the Egyptian worship and character, was the identity which these deities assumed by their priests and worshippers. The late talented author of Rameses (Note 12, vol. i.), has well expressed this curious fact. 'Whatever the character of the god was, his votaries esteemed themselves his visible proxies; and the priests endeavoured to express in their own persons, the characters and actions of the deities whom they served. This identity particularly manifested itself in the mysteries.'

Imagine, then, a set of gods whose characters and

*Lucian mentions (Jupiter. Tragæd. II.) that the people of Pelusium worshipped the onion. Pliny and others allude to this fact.